Key witness details 2008 slayings of 5 people

May 20, 2014|By Steve Schmadeke | Tribune reporter

One of three men charged with the 2008 slayings of five people in a South Side home testified this afternoon that he was only the look-out and didn't learn details of the murders until he was leaving a jailhouse Bible study with one of his co-defendants.

Arthur Brown, 31, agreed to testify at the trial of Torolan Williams in exchange for a sharply reduced sentence. He is also expected to testify against the third alleged killer, Michael King, who is awaiting trial.

The slayings took place in the Auburn-Gresham home of Donovan "Don P" Richardson, 24, an alleged pimp who was among the five victims.

Brown testified Tuesday that he only wanted to buy some marijuana in April 2008 and sought out Williams, but then found himself at what he later learned was a crime scene at 76th Street and Rhodes Avenue.

He said Williams and King brought flat-screen TVs and two duffel bags full of jewelry out into an alley where Williams had asked him to wait. Brown was later arrested after pawning two watches and a pair of earrings that were his cut from what he thought had been a simple break-in robbery.

Brown said he and Williams, who was arrested after bragging on the streets about his role in the robbery, were both held in Division 10 of the Cook County jail.

One day after a morning Bible study, Brown said he pulled Williams aside in a stairwell and asked him what had happened inside the house.

“(Williams) said he shot Don P while he was on the couch and he said there was a girl somewhere that wouldn’t stop screaming and he turned and shot her,” Brown testified.

The bodies were discovered April 23, 2008. All but Scales lived at the residence. Prosecutors said robbery was the motive.

According to testimony last week, a close friend of Richardson's told police soon after the slayings that Richardson was a pimp known for his displays of wealth, including a diamond-encrusted gold "Don P" medallion stolen in the robbery.

The friend said the two women worked as exotic dancers at a strip club in Harvey and gave Richardson their earnings.

Williams was arrested almost two months after the killings after he had allegedly been bragging about his involvement.

Detectives found him playing an Xbox, stolen from the crime scene, while he was visiting his girlfriend at Northwestern Memorial Hospital after she gave birth to their child, prosecutors said.

Scales' girlfriend, April Rutherford, 33, and Richardson's friend Terry Arrington, 30, testified last week they discovered the bodies. Rutherford said she went to the back door of the home when her boyfriend didn't return calls.

Rutherford found the knob on the back door had been knocked out and then discovered the house had been ransacked. She ran outside after spotting several bodies in the first-floor living room and called 911.

"Oh God," she said in a recording played in court. "We seen three dead bodies."

According to prosecutors, Williams told police that King recruited him to act as a lookout on a "sweet lick" -- or easy robbery -- that would yield $20,000 to $30,000.

He said he got only $400 from the proceeds, though he was also found with stolen TVs, Assistant State's Attorney Victoria Klegman said in her opening statement.

But Klegman said it was Brown, 31, who acted as the lookout. He pleaded guilty in 2012 and agreed to testify against the others in exchange for a 24-year prison sentence, prosecutors said.

Klegman said Brown got roped into the scheme after his car was impounded when police found marijuana inside and he needed cash to get it out so he could go to work.

Williams' attorney, Steve Stach, said in his opening statement that prosecutors needed to cut a deal after an extensive search for cellphone or physical evidence tying his client to the attack turned up nothing.

"The government makes a deal with the devil," said Stach, who told jurors that Brown was never honest with authorities until confronted with items from the robbery he had pawned off.

Stach said Williams was a young man who was tricked into participating in the robbery. He said Brown and King carried out the killings.

"TJ is and was a 22-year-old smart-aleck kid who got in with two guys much older than him who manipulated him and that are now trying to place the blame on him for their crimes," Stach told jurors.